Victims' rights initiative acts only on paper

Voters should judge ballot initiatives by their text and their potential effects on the state, not by their backers. But when the fellow financing a tough-on-crime measure is under federal indictment, that wrinkle is hard to ignore.

Henry T. Nicholas III, the billionaire co-founder of chip-maker Broadcom, spent nearly $5 million to qualify Proposition 9 for the November ballot. In the meantime, he's spent a sum only he and his lawyers know fighting drug, conspiracy and securities fraud charges that prosecutors unveiled in June.

But enough about him. Proposition 9 would marginally expand the legal rights that crime victims and their families already enjoy in California, tinker with the rules of parole hearings, and forbid — at least on paper — the state or counties from freeing inmates early when prisons and jails are full.

That last issue is especially relevant to Shasta County, where the Sheriff's Department has given out thousands of get-out-of-jail-free cards in recent years. If Nicholas had donated $5 million as a down payment toward solving that problem, we'd name him philanthropist of the year. But the initiative would do nothing concrete to solve jail overcrowding or end the court order capping the Shasta County jail's capacity.

We fully support Proposition 9's spirit of ensuring decent treatment of crime victims by the justice system, but the state already has excellent laws — passed by the voters in 1983 — to protect victims' rights.

Did the public cry out for further change? Or did a billionaire just have the cash to push his own legal agenda?

It looks like the latter to us. Indeed, Proposition 9 looks like Exhibit A of what's wrong with the initiative system. We urge a "No" vote on this superfluous measure.